Television

Big Magic to fortify programming with four new show launches

MUMBAI: Reliance Broadcast Network’s Hindi entertainment channel Big Magic is looking at fortifying its programming line-up with a slew of new show launches during the festive season.

After launching three new shows namely Chutki Baja Ke, Fakebook with Kavita and Comedy Ka Rocketover the last one month, Big Magic is gearing up to take its entertainment quotient a notch higher by unveiling four more shows in the coming weeks.

The first show, which is slated to go on air from 26 October will be an adaptation of the American game show Family Feud. Called Family Fortunes (as the British version is titled), the show will be aired from Monday – Thursday at 8:30 pm and is being produced by SOL. The channel has roped in Mantra as the host of Family Fortunes.

Speaking to Indiantelevision.com about the same, Big Magic creative director Bimal Unnikrishnan said, “Family Feud is the most loved and watched game show across the world, which has also been commissioned in over 65 other countries. As content will be tweaked and adapted for the Indian audience but the basic format of the show will remain the same. One of the reasons why we roped in Mantra is because he’s extremely talented, funny and presentable as a host.”

Family Fortunes (65 episodes) will run for 16 weeks on Big Magic. Currently, the channel is filming all the episodes and has readied a bank of the first 10 episodes. The game show gives participants an opportunity to win prizes by answering simple questions that have passed a generic survey. If their answers match with the top answers of the survey, they win points, which get translated into prizes.

Coming on board as the official radio partner, 92.7 Big FM will be promoting the show through Family Fortune hour every Monday - Friday at 7 pm across all its 45 stations pan India. The radio station will also give its listeners an opportunity to get a direct entry to the game show.

Big Magic’s second new show is a comedy titled Ji Sirji, which will go on air from 11 November and will be aired on Wednesday and Thursday at 10 pm.

Unnikrishnan said, “Ji Sirji is a satirical and humour show based on bad bosses, which will showcase the relationship between bosses and their subordinates.”

The third show is titled Bollywood Frydays and is based on social commentary on Bollywood. Come November, the show will be aired on Fridays. However, the exact date of launch has not yet been decided.

The fourth show is titled Lete Hai Khabar Khabron Ki and will go on air soon. The bi-weekly show, which will be hosted by actor Varun Badola, is a commentary on the latest happenings on the news platform across the country.

“The bi-weekly show will be based on the news scene in the country. We are planning to launch the series in the coming few weeks,” Unnikrishnan added.

Big Magic plans to launch these shows as finite series, which will have multiple seasons.

Speaking on the channel’s programming strategy, Unnikrishnan said, “We are a comedy channel and we will keep experimenting with new comedy shows with a different approach. Our programming strategy is to present unique comedy content for urban families. We realise that it is a great format that engages as well as provides a play along feature to the audience.”

“We are very optimistic about our content offering because I don’t think anybody else is providing the kind of content that we are planning to launch. It’s is really something that we are hoping will work,” he added.

RBNL recently adopted a unique strategy to launch integrated shows on its television (Big Magic) and radio (Big FM) platforms. The first two integrated shows launched were Fakebook with Kavita and Comedy Ka Rocket.

Speaking on promoting the content across radio, Unnikrishnan said, “Promoting content is another part of our strategy. We are promoting a lot of content on topicality and as a part of our strategy, we are using a 360 degree approach to promote our content across our radio platforms as well.”

MARKETING & PROMOTIONAL PLANS

Big Magic has identified the digital medium as the core platform to promote all its upcoming shows.

Discussing the channel’s marketing initiative, RBNL network chief marketing officer Manoj Lalwani said, “Digital media is the leading platform for promotions. For digital, we have a series of videos on Facebook, which will be pushing to our fan base. Other than that, we are running promotions on our own platforms including Big Magic.”

Unnikrishnan added, “For almost every show, we will be carrying out 360 degree promotional campaigns across all platforms. We have our own radio partner in Big FM, so all the content will be available on radio as well.”

The channel also plans to conduct crowd sourcing activities online and inviting participating. “We will be rolling out multiple contests and promotion activities online for our shows,” he informed.

Big Magic has received a positive response from advertisers. “There are brands, which are really impressed and are ready to work closely with us. The content will go across our radio stations apart from television and digital platforms and these are new opportunities that an advertiser can avail of. We are in the process of sealing a few deals,” informed Lalwani.

Grey Worldwide is the creative agency for the channel, whereas Resultrix Media Pvt. Ltd has been roped in as the digital agency.